104 PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS SECTION E. 



Transkei raises the expectation that, in other parts of the country 

 councils carried on along nearly the same lines will be acceptable 

 to the Natives, as it gives to them the management of such local 

 matters as concerns themselves directly. 



The Urban Areas Bill also proposes to give Natives in or near 

 towns a considerable say in the control of their own affairs. This 

 new departure in local government will, we think, be of great 

 service to the Native people generally. 



These are some of the grave questions that are within the 

 rim of our immediate consideration. This is, and has always been 

 a land of problems. This is not as some hold a misfortune. It 

 may indeed be a blessing. To the existence of these manifold 

 difficulties may be due the fact that we have never lacked in 

 this land great statesmen, or wise philanthropists, or able teachers. 

 Our very difficulties create the means of dealing with them ; give 

 us the men to cope with them. 



I have written at greater length than I meant to when I 

 began; but the importance of my subject is my excuse. 



We will never make progress in the solution of any of the 

 aspects of the problem unless we try to understand the Native 

 people. The problem would have less of danger in it if we under- 

 stood each other more. And the measure of our success in solving 

 the problem will be the measure of our understanding one another. 

 That the one race will fully and perfectly understand the other is 

 impossible. Traditions, and customs, and beliefs, and language 

 all c-reate barriers in the way. But we ought not to be compara- 

 tive strangers the one to the ways and thoughts and aspirations 

 of the other, as I think too often we are. 



I crave forgiveness for this pei'sonal note but I am convinced 

 that with a race so peculiarly constituted in temper and in attach- 

 ments as the Natives are, it is the personal aspect of things that 

 coiuit. 



